


How Hard Can It Be?

by jooliewrites



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Hacker Oliver, M/M, Oliver's Mom - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-20
Updated: 2015-04-20
Packaged: 2018-03-24 21:41:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3785242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jooliewrites/pseuds/jooliewrites
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“So spill,” Connor says.</p>
<p>“Spill what?” Oliver’s focused on the task at hand and is clearly distracted by Connor’s question.</p>
<p>“Spill,” Connor repeats with a wave of his hand to the computer on Oliver’s lap, as if any of that is an explanation. When Oliver stays quiet and focused, Connor further clarifies. “How did you get into all this stuff? The computer stuff.”</p>
<p>“You really want to know?” Connor nods and Oliver cocks his head to the side, debating, before pausing the program. What the hell? “It actually all started as an accident when I was in college.”</p>
<p>+</p>
<p>Oliver's hacking origins</p>
            </blockquote>





	How Hard Can It Be?

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on tumblr.  
> Hope you enjoy,  
> -Jules xoxo

“So spill,” Connor says as he curls up next to Oliver on the couch. He props his head on Oliver’s shoulder and watches with fascination as Oliver’s fingers fly over the keys.

“Spill what?” Oliver’s focused on the task at hand and is clearly distracted by Connor’s question.

“Spill,” Connor repeats with a wave of his hand to the computer on Oliver’s lap, as if any of that is an explanation. When Oliver stays quiet and focused, Connor further clarifies. “How did you get into all this stuff? The computer stuff.”

“It was my major.” Connor already knows that. What is he trying to gain from this conversation?

Connor rolls his eyes but Oliver doesn’t notice, his eyes still fixed on the screen. “I meant, how did you get into all this hacking stuff? You know. Hacking into phones and bank accounts and NATO and everything.”

“I never hacked into NATO,” Oliver says, still focused on the task at hand. “I don’t think I would do well at Guantanamo.”

Another eye roll. “Come on. Really. How’d you start down this path of lawlessness?”

“Lawlessness?” Oliver turns with a look of disbelief. “You asked me to get into a middle-aged woman’s Facebook. This is hardly the stuff of cyber warriors.”

Connor just shrugs. “My question still stands. How’d you start?”

“You really want to know?” Connor nods and Oliver cocks his head to the side, debating, before pausing the program. What the hell? “It actually all started as an accident when I was in college.”

+

“Okay, Mom,” Oliver says into the phone. His mom had called him after he got out of class in a blind panic because she’d been locked out of her email account. It’d taken him the entire walk back to his dorm room to get her to calm down and assure her that he would fix it. “I’m trying to get back into your account and the security question is ‘What street did you grow up on?’”

“I don’t remember the street name, Oliver!” she bemoans. “I’m almost fifty-years-old. How am I supposed to remember that far back?”

His mother turned fifty-seven on her last birthday but Oliver lets the lie slide without comment; she has been lying about her age for as long as he can remember. “Well, you picked the question. Did you put something else down?” He types in her current street name. “Because Seventh isn’t it.”

“Um…” Oliver listens to her twist the phone cord around her hand as she tries to remember. “Maybe Elmwood?”

“What house was on Elmwood?” he asks as he types.

“The condo we moved into after we got married. Elmwood Court.” Her voice trails off with memory. “That condo was so cheap. Practically no insulation in the walls. Did I ever tell you about the time our pipes burst?”

“Yes, Mom,” Oliver replies. He’s heard the story so many times that he actually starts mouthing along as she continues telling it once again.

“Your father was at work and all of a sudden there was this terrible noise from the unit above. This crash! Then water started just pouring in from the ceiling.” Her voice rises a little with the pitch of the story and Oliver can tell she’s gesturing wildly as she tells it. She always gets animated telling this story. “And I just—I didn’t know what to do. Your brother was just a baby and I didn’t know Angela yet. They lived upstairs. Angela Swierczek. You remember the Swierczeks? Their daughter babysat you a few times. They had that pool and the dog you didn’t like and–”

“Mom! I’ve heard this story a thousand times. Can we please focus on this?” Oliver snaps. He closes his eyes and waits; he shouldn’t have snapped at her like that.

She makes him sweat it out a beat before responding, low and slow, “You don’t take that tone with me, Oliver.”

He pinches the bridge of his nose. He knows that. “I’m sorry.”

“I’m going through enough right now,” she says, her voice deliberately measured, holding the emotion back. “With your father and your grandmother and your sister. And now my email isn’t working. And it’s all, just—I don’t need this from you too.” Her voice breaks a little at the end and Oliver feels like shit.

“I know. I’m sorry,” Oliver repeats, thoroughly chastened.

They are silent for a moment until his mother softly asks, “Did Elmwood work?”

“No.”

“God—” She cuts the curse word off and Oliver’s eyes open wide in shock. His mother does not swear. Ever. “Well, I don’t know what else it could be!” Oliver doesn’t say anything and waits for her to continue. “Can you call them or something? Or email them?”

“You want to email them about your email not working?” Oliver questions.

“ _You_ would email them, Oliver,” she fires back. “I can’t email them. I don’t have email.”

“I don’t think I can email them.”

“Well, then call them,” she says.

“They don’t have a phone—”

“Are you really telling me that Google doesn’t have a number? Google doesn’t have a phone. All those offices and money they make and they don’t have a good, old-fashioned phone?”

“I’m not saying they don’t have a phone, Mom,” he explains. “I’m saying that I don’t know if you can call them to get back into your email.”

“Well, I don’t have time for this anymore.” Oliver can hear her shuffling around the kitchen and assumes she’s throwing things into her purse. “I have to meet the women from church.”

“What do you want me to do about it, Mom?” Is this now officially his problem?

“I don’t know,” she answers, slightly breathless and obviously frustrated. “I don’t know. I just know that I don’t know what the answers to those questions are and I can’t get my email and I need to email your aunt. And your father’s doctor was supposed to email the instructions for his new pills and now I can’t get them and—”

“Okay.” Oliver blows out a breath. This is now officially his problem. He looks at the mound of work on his desk and the lecture he’s missing right now and the study group planned for after said lecture. He pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Okay.” She huffs out a breath of her own and he waits. “I’m sorry to get angry with you. I don’t mean too.”

“I know, Mom.”

“I don’t like the email,” she says.

“I know, Mom.”

“And I love you. And I’m sorry.” Both of these are sincere and sweet and make him smile.

“I know. I love you too,” Oliver replies. “And I’ll let you know if I can get back into your account.”

They hang up and Oliver ponders the screen with the Wrong Password error message shouting at him in red. He glances over to the coding books piled on the floor next to him and then back at the screen.

How hard could it really be?

+

“That’s it?” Connor looks less than impressed. “That is your story of how you started hacking. You broke into your mother’s email because she forgot her password.”

“Yeah.” Oliver smiles a little at Connor’s obvious disappointment. “What did you expect?”

“I don’t know.” Connor turns back to face the screen and plucks invisible lint off his pants. “Something else.”

“Something cooler,” Oliver says knowingly, turning back to continue breaking into Connor’s client’s Facebook page. The apartment is quiet for a moment except for the click of Oliver’s fingers flying over keys. “I told you before, it’s really not that hard.” Connor scoffs in his ear. “ _I’m_ not—it’s not anything special.”

Connor’s hand, which had been casually thrown the back of the couch, snakes into Oliver’s hair to pull his face around. Crashing their lips together in a kiss that is quick and firm, Connor pulls back to look catch Oliver’s gaze. “Don’t say that.”

“But it’s the—”

Connor cuts off Oliver’s self-deprecating remark with another firm kiss. “Never again,” he repeats, pulling back and swiping a thumb along Oliver’s jaw.

“Okay,” Oliver says.

“Good. Now keep typing, Oliver,” Connor murmurs as he nuzzles the side of Oliver’s neck and lightly nips at the side of his jaw. “Faster you type, faster you get your reward.”

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr](http://ramblesandreblogs.tumblr.com/)


End file.
